Role of catfishing hoax in Manti Te'o's draft stock 'blown out of proportion', Jerry Reese says

Former Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o has said he was the victim of an elaborate internet hoax, which teams must explore before rating him on their draft boards.J. Meric/Getty Images

INDIANAPOLIS -- Manti Te'o is scheduled to meet with the media at this week's NFL Scouting Combine, and he faces even more important interviews with the NFL teams who could draft him this spring. Each session will no doubt address the bizarre 'catfishing' internet hoax involving the Notre Dame linebacker.

But Giants general manager Jerry Reese said the most important answers he's looking for are on Te'o's game film.

"We’re more interested in what kind of football player he is more than anything else," Reese said today. "I think that these things get blown out of proportion a little bit. But we’ll investigate it, and we’ll see where it goes."

Reese was referring to the bizarre situation, and the rampant speculation about how the hoax will affect Te'o's draft status. The Heisman finalist's inspiration following the death of his grandmother and girlfriend became a national storyline last fall, until it was revealed last month that the girlfriend did not exist. Te'o said he had been duped in an elaborate set-up.

Reese said the Giants would meet with Te'o as part of the interview and evaluation process that takes place at the Combine.

"We’ll bring him in, and we’ll let him explain that situation for us," Reese said. "But again, I think there’s people with a lot more issues than this issue."

The Giants are linebacker-needy, and without reading too much into Reese's comments, it sounded like they would consider Te'o. Michael Boley was recently released, Chase Blackburn and Keith Rivers are both free agents and Mark Herzlich, Spencer Paysinger and Jacquian Williams are still developing.

The Giants' top two picks are 19th overall (first round) and 49th overall (second round). Reese warned against letting certain accessory issues -- such as what takes place on social media, the platform for catfishing -- cloud a team's judgement of football players.

"I think you can have too much information," Reese said. "You talk yourself out of some good players maybe by what somebody said on Twitter or what somebody said on Facebook. 'Well, this guy said this on Facebook, so let’s not take him.' He’s in the Pro Bowl for 10 years, you know? You can overanalyze; you can have too much information. So I think you have to be careful with respect to that."

Reese did not mean to say they would discount this unusual off-the field situation. Teams will have to consider any role Te'o had in perpetuating the sympathetic storyline, and how he has handled the public fallout when the hoax was uncovered, but it goes into a package of what kind of NFL football player he could be.

"We put it all in the hopper, and we come out with, 'OK, this is what this guy is, this is where we think he should be on our board,' " Reese said. "Would we take him if he’s at a certain position for us? Just like everybody else. This situation is no different from anybody else."